2013 GBC Heartland Challenge ATV Endurance Racing Carlisle, Iowa August 17, 2013

The Yamaha team got off to a bad start and began the marathon race with a two minute deficit to the rest of the pack. Soon after getting moving the motor in Fowler’s ATV blew and set the team back further.

The Yamaha team of Walker Fowler, Johnny Gallagher, & Gabe Phillips made their way from the rear of the pack to make their way into the top three

The team found their groove about an hour into the race and began to gain on the Woodhead Mafia.  On lap four, they moved into third place where they remained for eleven laps. On lap fifteen, the Yamaha racers were able to overtake second place and put on a hard charge for the leaders. They closed the gap from over five minutes on lap 19 to around three minutes on lap 22. On lap 31, Fowler closed the gap to just 23.750 and charged to get around the Honda racers. The gap was as small as 09.891 on lap 33. Despite a hard charge to the finish Team Yamaha finished 44.321 behind Team Woodhead Mafia.

“It came down to the end, we had our best guy out there and they (Woodhead Mafia) had their best guy out there. As much as I would like to win, we gave it all we had and have nothing to hang our heads about,” said Gallagher. 

Team Yamaha placed second at the 2013 Heartland Challenge on their Yamaha YFZ450R ATV less than a minute behind the leaders

“I put on a hard charge at the end, I was running on Phillips’ Yamaha since I blew mine up and I felt really good. We came up shy on the win, it’s a bummer but we’ve won three in a row out here so I guess four wasn’t meant to be. We really wanted to get the win today, but we’ll be back next year to try again,” regarded Fowler after the race.

Despite blowing an engine in one ATV and a transmission in another, Team MAXC carried on to claim a podium position aboard their Honda 450R ATV

Third place went to Team MAXC from Bicknell, Indiana. Ryan Lane, Brycen Neal and Jody Estes raced their Hondas to the final podium spot. The Team had a great start, but ran into trouble when they blew an engine in one quad and dropped the transmission out of another. That left the final eight hours of racing to Ryan Lane’s Honda TRX 450R. The team and the single quad rallied and Neal rode the final leg of the race to finish just one lap down of the winning team.

Team MAXC Racing of Ryan Lane, Brycen Neal and Jody Estes rounded out the 2013 Heartland Challenge Pro Class in third

“We had a good start and had a good pace going. We got a little messed up when we lost two quads. We all rode mine for the final eight hours and when Brycen finished it was steaming. We don’t like to lose, but third place is OK. We had a good time and the track was fun,” explained Lane after the race.

Heartland Challenge AA Pro Class Podium (left to right) Team MAXC Racing (3rd), Team Woodhead Mafia (1st), Team Yamaha (2nd)